It's a whole new Enterprise: The latest "Star Trek" trailer

I admit it: Somewhere along the way I lost track of the big-screen "Star Trek" series. I know I saw the first six or seven, and I vaguely remember "Insurrection," but I'm sure I missed a couple of them altogether. When "Star Trek" first hit the cineplex in 1979, it was a huge event (even though the first movie was generally underwhelming) and everyone's curiosity was piqued; the same was true a couple of years later when "Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan" opened in the summer of 1982.

That enthusiasm lasted through "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home" in 1986. But after the crashing disappointment of "Star Trek V: The Final Frontier" ("What does God need with a starship?"), the series seemed to fall into a hit-or-miss pattern: Some fans insist that all the even-numbered "Star Trek" films are good, while the odd-numbered ones are dicey at best.

The last of the cinematic "Star Trek" epics was "Star Trek: Nemesis" in 2002. I didn't see it, and apparently quite a few other moviegoers found better things to do with their ticket money: "Nemesis" took in barely $40 million at the box office, less than a third of what the most successful entries in the series had collected.

Now, it's up to J.J. Abrams to re-energize the old franchise with the plainly titled "Star Trek," opening May 8. Technically, it would be an odd-numbered entry -- the 11th -- although Abrams and company would probably prefer to think of this project as the start of something entirely new, sort of along the lines of what Christopher Nolan did with "Batman Begins."

The film reveals the backstories of James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) and Spock (Zachary Quinto). The cast also includes Simon Pegg as Scotty, Zoe Saldana as Uhura, Bruce Greenwood as Enterprise captain Christopher Pike, Eric Bana as the villainous Nero and Winona Ryder as Spock's mother.